Low turnout for transit meeting

Approximately 20 people turned out to a meeting last week at the British Club to share ideas on a name for the region’s new rapid transit system.

“It’s not as many as we would have liked, but it wasn’t a bad turnout,” said Kimberley Moser, Region of Waterloo’s rapid transit community relations manager.

Although regional staff have suggested three names, meetings were held across the region to see how residents feel about the choices.

“We had one family with three kids show up with a painting they had made. They were convinced it should be called the iKWIC,” Moser said. “I-KWIC stands for I as in iXpress, Kitchener-Waterloo into Cambridge.”

Other suggestions made were the Dart, Folly Trolley and the Wave.

Moser said the latter two names have been suggested a number of times by the community.

In recent weeks, regional transportation staff released three possible names drawn from a pool of more than 400 gathered by consultant, Quarry Integrated Communications. The project has a budget of $75,000. The front running names for the rapid transit system are Ion, Arc and Trio.

In other meetings, 72 people turned out in Waterloo, while 45 people attended an open house in Kitchener. In addition, more than 2,000 people have visited the rapid transit website as of Tuesday night and more than 500 people had filled out surveys online.

Moser said people can still participate in the online survey at http://rapidtransit.regionofwaterloo.ca/en/ until tonight at midnight.